Celebrity hair stylist Chris Appleton opens up on his "darkest nights," says he contemplated ending his life

Chris Appleton has made himself a prominent name over the years as a hair stylist to several celebrities.

The 42-year-old was recently on Jay Shetty's On Purpose Podcast, where he opened up about a difficult time in his life when things got so hard for him that he contemplated taking his own life. He said,

“I felt like it would be better for them to have a dad that was dead than a dad that was gay. It's not something I've ever spoken about.”

He went on to say,

“All of a sudden, I just felt like I'd just messed their life up, and I felt like I'd failed as a dad because my job was to protect them and if anyone ever hurt them, I would protect them. But I was the one [who] hurt them, and I couldn't understand that.”

Chris Appleton opens up about struggles

Before coming out publicly, Chris Appleton was married to Katie Katon. The pair share two children, Billy and Kitty-blu. During his interview with Jay Shetty, Appleton shared that the hardest part of coming out was admitting the truth to his kids.

“But the hardest part was telling my kids. I felt like it was like a cancer. I wanted to clear it out of me.”

The heightened stress and anxiety of the situation led Chris Appleton down a dark road,

“I brought a bottle of alcohol and I checked myself into a hotel, and the whole time I had a picture of the kids. It was like this computer case it had and them smiling on it. They wrote a message on it. It was silly, it was just a little computer case, but I was just holding it the whole time,”

He added,

“I closed my eyes and I just thought, this is it. This is it. I won't hurt anyone anymore... and maybe I'll stop hurting too.”

Luckily, Chris woke up in the hospital, and by his own admission,

“In that moment, something changed. I decided to live. So, although it was one of the darkest nights of my life, I think it was a turning point. And like I say, it's not something I take lightly.”

The high-profile hair stylist went on to add,

"I think it's not something I've ever spoken about. But I hope other people in watching this can maybe feel heard or seen and find the help they need, or even maybe it's a parent that's struggling and understanding their child to understand how dark it can be when you're left in silence and when you don't get to express who you truly are, or even if it's the kid that did the bullying at school, and see how painful it can really be for someone."

Chris Appleton also revealed on the podcast that he has penned a book titled, Your Roots Don't Define You which will debut in 2026.

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